'Everybody's so different and yet everybody has this common bond': Identity construction, exploration, and negotiation among adolescents in two youth development programs

In this study, I explore how processes of identity construction, exploration, and negotiation occurred among adolescents in two theatrical youth development programs. Drawing on data collected from 40 semi-structured interviews and 175 hours of participant observation with young people and facilitators involved in two theatre-based after-school dating violence prevention programs, I investigate how adolescents understood their own and others' multiple identity dimensions, and how these understandings informed group identity. I use frameworks of social construction and symbolic interaction to examine how interpersonal interaction simultaneously challenged and (re)produced norms regarding race, class, gender, sexuality, and religion. I also examine the unique role of theatrical practice in these processes of identity construction and communication with others.;The youth constructed their identities (and the identities of others) using several linguistic and embodied processes. The linguistic processes included (1) labeling themselves as members of particular identities, (2) using common language to construct (sub)groups of identity, (3) 'puzzling through' the meanings of particular identities, and (4) othering---using moral justifications to construct themselves as different from and better than people of different identities. The embodied processes included (1) externally marking their appearances (with clothes, jewelry, etc.) to signify certain identities, (2) moving their bodies and touching (or not touching) other people in particular ways as part of inhabiting their identities, and (3) expressing (and suppressing) particular emotions in order to feel authentically part of their identities.;In addition to being locations in which certain identities were (re)produced, the youth development programs were sites of construction of new identities, such as "theatre person" and "someone who has experienced abuse." The programs were also places where the youth met and learned how to build relationships with people of diverse identities. I discuss implications of these findings for social work practice with youth as well as for future research in the areas of youth development, group work and adolescent identity.